Disclaimer: I don't own anyone associated with the WWE, only the doctors and other OC's.

A/N: See first chapter for major notes about setting, injuries, title, etc. Also, I'm not going to withhold chapters if I don't get a certain number of reviews, but that doesn't mean that I don't love reading them. It's discouraging to see people looking at the story but not leaving a message.

The start of Jeff's treatment was rough for both Hardy brothers. Jeff was restricted to two days bed rest as soon as he got home, something which aggravated him to no end. The high-flyer was used to being able to move around and do whatever he wanted; he did not like his sudden inactivity and lack of movement. While it amused Matt at first, the endless calls of "I'm thirsty" or "I want food" soon wore down his patience.

After that there were endless meetings with Jeff's new doctor, Dr. Carleson, and his physical therapist Mike Green. They needed to figure out what sort of treatments were going to use, since everyone had agreed that surgery should be avoided if at all possible. They also needed to discuss the possibility of staying in a rehab center if Matt couldn't get the time off, and on top of that was the actual therapy itself. Not only did Matt have to drive Jeff to all of these meetings, and end up being bored out of his skull for a couple of hours as he waited for them to end, he was also on edge waiting for Mr. McMahon to call.

"Man, this physical therapy thing is so pointless," Jeff complained on the way back from his first therapy session. "Do you know what they're having me do? Strengthen my back muscles! I am a professional wrestler- I already have strong back muscles!"

"Well, if Dr. Carleson says it'll help then I'm sure it will." Matt tried to keep his tone light hearted, but the effect was ruined as he sighed and looked down at his cell phone.

"Matt, he'll call eventually," Jeff said reassuringly. "Don't worry about it; I'm sure he'll give you the time off."

"And what if he doesn't?" Matt snapped. "What if he doesn't give me the time off? You'll be stuck in a rehab center while I'm on the road! How do you-" He paused, frowning, and grabbed his cell phone. "Hello?" His eyes widened. ", hello…yes…yes… I understand, sir… Seriously? Thank you, sir! Yes… yes… I will sir. Thank you!"

Matt hung up his phone and turned to face his brother. His whole face was lit up, replacing the worried, anxious look that was there before. "He gave me two months off! Vince McMahon actually gave me two months off and told me he'd negotiate more if need be!"

Jeff grinned. "That's awesome! Very un-Vince-like, but I'm not complaining. Did he tell you what they were doing about the storyline, since both of us are out?"

The smile on Matt's face faded a little bit. "Well, the details aren't completely worked out yet, so I'm not entirely sure what's going on. He said we might not even get the information until Monday. All I know is that he wants both of us on Raw."

"Woah, slow down a second, both of us? Did he say why?"

Matt shook his head. "No, like I said, the details aren't completely worked out yet." He glanced over at his brother and asked, "Why, is something wrong?"

Jeff frowned slightly and slowly shook his head. "No, no, it's just… he does remember that I'm injured, right?"

Matt let out a short bark of laughter. "This coming from the guy who didn't even want to take time off in the first place?"

"Yeah, well that was before I realized what a pain in the ass therapy is. I am not going to injure myself even more and have to put up with this for longer!" Jeff snapped, his patience quickly wearing out.

"Hey, calm down. This is Vince we're talking about. He may be tough on us- hell, he may hate us on occasion- but he wouldn't do anything to hurt someone who's already injured," Matt reassured him. "You're going to be perfectly fine on Monday. Don't worry."

Jeff knew that Matt was telling the truth. He had worked with the WWE long enough to know that they wouldn't do anything to purposefully risk him hurting himself more, but there was still always the chance that it could happen on accident; every time a superstar stepped into the ring they risked injuring themselves. Still, no amount of reassurance that he would be fine could curb Dr. Carleson's anger when he heard the news that Jeff would be appearing on Raw that week.

"Do you realize the danger you are putting yourself into?" Dr. Carleson wasn't yelling- yet. With the way he was fuming and seething, Jeff would have been very surprised if he didn't start shouting very soon.

"I'm not going to be in any danger!" Jeff repeated for what must have been the millionth time that day. "Look, Matt got another call just this morning, they have most of the details ironed out and I won't be wrestling at all. There's going to be some taunting and Matt'll beat up Orton. At most I'll just clothesline him!"

"Can you guarantee that?" Dr. Carleson asked. "Can you guarantee that once you get into the ring things won't get out of hand and you won't get hurt accidentally?" Jeff was silent; he knew that there was a chance that things would get out of control. He couldn't completely guarantee that once the yelling started, and especially the fighting, that he wouldn't do something potentially stupid without thinking it through first.

"C'mon, he's going to be fine!" Matt said, finally breaking the silence. "I mean, yeah, things can get out of hand but Jeff's not going to do anything to risk his career and I'm going to be the one doing the actual fighting. I won't let him do anything stupid. Besides, you couldn't-" Jeff quickly elbowed his brother in the side so he wouldn't finish that sentence. While it may be true that Dr. Carleson couldn't actually do anything to stop them, he just wanted to get the confrontation over and get out of there as soon as possible.

Dr. Carleson narrowed his eyes slightly, but didn't comment on what Matt was going to say. Instead, he sighed, but finally relented. "Fine, go to Raw if you must. I'll be counting on you-" he looked at Matt. "-to make sure he doesn't do anything stupid. But you're in luck; you'll never guess what I got today…"

Dr. Carleson stepped by them out of the room. When he returned, Jeff's mouth dropped open in shock and Matt looked like he was on the brink of laughter. "Oh no…" Jeff's eyes were wide open as he stared at what Dr. Carleson was holding. "Oh hell no, I am not going on Raw wearing that!"

"We agreed when we first discussed your treatment that you were going to have to wear a back brace for extra support," Dr. Carleson reminded him. "I don't care if you're going to be on national television on Monday. In fact, given what you're going to be doing I'm going to feel a lot better knowing that you're in the brace."

XXXXX

Jeff would have continued to grumble about his need to wear a back brace for the last few days leading up to Raw, but after the first couple of hours Matt started threatening him with bodily harm if he didn't shut up. They may have been close but there's only so much whining one person could take before they lost it. Still, those last few days passed without much happening besides Jeff's physical therapy, which always left him drained and annoyed at everything.

Finally Monday rolled around, bringing with it the usual physical therapy session on top of another meeting with Dr. Carleson, who spent most of the time reminding Jeff to not do anything stupid that night on Raw. However, he managed to escape without causing another huge arguement and the rest of the day passed relatively quickly.

Jeff would have preferred to stay away from the arena for as long as possible, so there would be a smaller amount of time he would be seen in the back brace. Matt, on the other hand, wanted to get there earlier so they could find out exactly what would be happening and so they would have time to go over things with Orton. In the end, Jeff won the argument by reminding Matt that they didn't need to get ready for a huge match or really go over anything before arriving there, so they arrived at the arena only slightly later than they would have under normal circumstances.

Unfortunately, their late arrival meant that nearly everyone else was already there. They ran into several of their coworkers on the way to the locker room and each time Jeff just did his best to fend off their questions "Yeah, I'm out for a couple of months… No, no surgery right now, just physical therapy and the back brace... Well, the most I can do right now is walk; Matt has to chauffer me around…"

Then the person shifted their attention to Matt and it was his turn to try to answer all of the questions. "No, I got two months off to deal with Jeff… Well, otherwise he'd be staying in a rehab center… The most I know is that there's going to be some sort of confrontation with Orton… No, I don't know anything more than that…"

After this, the conversation would end with wishes for Jeff's speedy recovery. At first Jeff was touched at his coworkers' well-wishes, but after repeating the same conversation again and again and again all Matt and Jeff wanted to do was get to the locker room as fast as possible before going to find out exactly what they were supposed to be doing that night. When the shouts of "Matt! Jeff!" echoed down the hallway the Hardys wanted to do nothing more than just keep walking and ignore them, but they did stop and turn around, to see Cena running towards them.

"We've had this conversation a million times, do you just want the shortened version of the information or do you actually want to ask the questions first?" Jeff was only half-joking; he wouldn't mind just giving the information and then getting to leave, despite the fact that he was on pretty good terms with the WWE champion.

"Shortened version if you don't mind, you two need to go find Vince; he said something about going over a change in the script for tonight," Cena told them.

"Wait, slow down a second a change in the script?" Matt asked. "What're they changing? I just thought they were going to iron out some details, not change things around!"

"Calm down, I think it's just a small change for Jeff, nothing major."

Jeff frowned. "What kind of small change? I thought I wasn't going to be doing much of anything, not with my back the way it is…"

"I don't think the change had anything to do with you fighting," Cena reassured him. "Though now that you mention is, how is your back? I heard both of you are taking a couple of months off- is that true?"

"Yeah, it's true; Amazingly, Vince gave Matt some time off so I don't have to stay in a rehab center, since the most I can do is walk," Jeff said. "And my back and legs are pretty sore most of the time, especially after physical therapy, but hey, if it helps I'm not complaining."

Cena smiled sympathetically. "Yeah, physical therapy can be brutal," he told him. "But what's wrong with your back exactly? Some of the guys are saying it's a vertebrae problem, is it really?"

Jeff just nodded. "Slipped vertebra. They think the leg pain is nerve compression though, but they're hopeful that the physical therapy will just take care of that too. I still need to wear this damn brace for support though." He tapped a knuckle against his brace to emphasize his words.

"Listen, you just rest up that back of yours, okay? It won't do you any good to injure it even more than it already is."

"Yeah, I know," Jeff said. "As much as I hate to cut this short, Matt and I should probably go find Vince, see what that change is."

After they all said their goodbyes, Matt and Jeff all but ran to find Mr. McMahon. They reached his office after a few minutes and, after knocking and receiving permission to come in, entered the office to talk to the chairman of the WWE. He looked up as they opened the door. "Ah, good, I was hoping you'd stop by soon."

"We ran into Cena on the way over here and he told us you wanted to talk about a change in the script for tonight."

"Well, it's really only a small change. You see, the writers really want to emphasize your injury, make it seem like its more career-threatening than it actually is," Mr. McMahon explained. "The brace was good-" Jeff scowled at the mention of the brace, but remained silent "-however, we feel that we needed something that would make more of an impact."

He motioned to the back corner of his office and both brothers turned around to see what was there. Their reactions were nearly identical to when Jeff's brace was brought out- Jeff was in shock and Matt looked like he was about to start laughing. "You want me in a wheelchair? Mr. McMahon, you can not be serious!" Jeff said.

"Oh, I am serious," Mr. McMahon assured him. "Orton's going to call back to have one or two of our employees wheel you out and put you in the ring- feel free to struggle with them a bit, by the way. When the fight starts you can get out of the chair, but play up the injury- make it seem like it hurts to stand up, collapse after punching him- that sort of thing." Mr. McMahon looked down at his watch. "You're going to be out first and the show is starting in ten minutes, so I suggest you get ready to go out."

Jeff glared at his boss and silently left the room while Matt muttered a goodbye, grabbed the wheelchair, and ran after him. "Jeff, c'mon, calm down a bit, it's just a wheelchair, it's not a big deal…"

Jeff spun around and glared at his brother. "Not a big deal? Do you want to go out to the ring the wheelchair then?" He shook his head. "Emphasize my injury… man, this is just going to be embarrassing! I can't go out there in a wheelchair!"

"You don't really have much of a choice!" Matt said. "Look, I know it sucks. Hell, I wouldn't want to be the one in the wheelchair, but what are you going to do about it? Everything's planned around this, there isn't time to change it. We'll just go out there, do our thing, and it'll be over before soon enough." He paused for a moment to grin at his brother. "Besides, you don't want to let the fans down, do you?"

Jeff glared at Matt. Both of them knew that as soon as the fans were mentioned, Jeff would do anything. He loved performing for the fans; he would always give it his all and do his best to make sure they were satisfied, even if that meant sitting in the damn wheelchair. He scowled at his brother and looked away. "Fine," he muttered. "Let's just get this over with."

Orton had just started talking when they arrived in the gorilla position. Jeff sat down in the wheelchair, still scowling, and watched Orton on one of the nearby TV's. "I've put your precious Jeff Hardy out for good," he was saying. "Your little high-flying hero can barely walk after what I did to him last night!" A clip of the end of their match played, complete with Jeff being taken out on the stretcher; by the time the clip ending the crowd was booing Orton again. "What? You don't believe me? Well come on, bring him out then, so everyone can see what I did to him!"

That was the cue. Two men dressed like security guards grabbed Jeff's wheelchair, with each one holding onto a handle. As Jeff's music started playing they wheeled him out. At first, when the music first came on, the crowd was deafening, but as Jeff was pushed down the ramp, the cheers slowly began to die down as everyone stared at him in complete shock. Jeff wanted nothing more than to scream that he was fine but he had to follow the script for that night. Still, Mr. McMahon had said that he could fight the security guards and he did to the best of his ability, considering how limited his movement was with both the brace and the wheelchair, all while yelling about how he didn't want to be wheeled out there.

However, despite his genuine efforts to beat the two men away, it wasn't long before they reached the ring. One of them held out his arm and Jeff, remembering that he wasn't supposed to be able to stand, slowly and shakily stood up and leaned on it, though he was still scowling at the whole situation. Meanwhile the other man put the chair into the ring. Then, for the first time in his life, Jeff Hardy was helped into the ring and sat down in the wheelchair once more. He took the microphone that was passed to him as Orton began speaking again.

"I told you I wasn't lying!" He said. "I told you he could barely walk and here he is, stuck in a wheelchair! So tell me, Hardy, how does it feel to go from one of the top superstars on Raw to not even being able to support yourself?" He ignored the crowd's boos and continued talking. "Yeah, that's right, your brother is sacrificing his career to look after you! I bet that doesn't sit well, does it? The Hardy brothers, reduced to nothing!"

"Man, just shut the hell up!" Jeff finally said. "First off, don't act like you know what you're talking about and don't you dare talk about Matt that way. You know nothing about us or about what's going on right now, nothing."

Randy Orton suddenly lashed out at Jeff, his eyes blazing with mock-anger. He knocked Jeff out of the wheelchair, effectively starting the fight, though with Jeff having to act like he was more injured than he really was, it wasn't really much of a fight. Still, the crowd was going wild and to Jeff that was really all that mattered. Not long after the 'fight' started, the crowd's cheers got even louder and Jeff knew that his brother had finally arrived. Sure enough, Matt soon slid into the ring and began fighting Orton himself.

Jeff was acting like the ropes were the only thing supporting him as he watched his brother essentially fight his battle for him. He waited for the right opportunity to come forward and end the fight, like what was originally planned. That opportunity came sooner than he thought, with Orton throwing his brother over the top rope and out of the ring. As he turned back around, Jeff let go of the ropes and threw himself at Orton, knocking him on his back.

That should've been the end of the match; there weren't any plans beyond that point, except for Matt helping Jeff back up the ramp. However, those plans didn't take into account Jeff's anger at being forced into a wheelchair for most of the confrontation. He wasn't going to be content with just watching from the sidelines and getting one good punch on Orton. He staggered to his feet, leaning on the ropes again so the storyline wasn't ruined too much. He undid his back brace and threw it down in the ring before climbing through the ropes and standing by one of the corners.

The blood pounding in his head drowned out any other noise- the crowd, JR, The King… everyone. His eyes were fixed on the top turnbuckle, his ultimate goal that night. Slowly, still partially attempting to act like he was severely injured, he began to climb up onto the turnbuckles. He reached the top one and remained crouched for a moment, 'supporting' himself with the ropes. Orton was staring at him with a look of horror on his face, but didn't move. No one tried to stop him or interfere with whatever he was going to do; no one wanted to risk accidentally hurting him even more.

By this time Matt had gotten up and was yelling at his brother to get down, but Jeff didn't hear him. Jeff let go of the ropes and slowly, very slowly, stood up to his full height. He didn't stop to think about what would happen next. His blood was still pounding and he was still pissed. He needed this outlet, screw the consequences. He raised his arms, complete with his hand sign, like he usually did before the Swanton. Then, just for a brief moment, the pounding died down and he heard everything- the crowd going wild as they realized what he was going to do, the announcers too shocked to actually act like it was planned, but still yelling out what was happening, and Matt yelling at him to get down before he hurt himself even more.

Jeff looked down at his brother for a brief moment. He may have been doing this out of anger, but it was also partially to show his brother that he wasn't helpless. That he didn't need to sacrifice anything to be with him, that he could fight his own battles. Orton's words earlier had stung, since part of him knew that he had been telling the truth; Matt may very well have been sacrificing at least part of his career to take care of him.

He looked away from his brother and, without another thought, leapt off the top turnbuckle, the screams from everyone around him following him on his way down.